Gilfaethwy son of Don & The Ploughman

Gilfaethwy son of Don & The Ploughman

It is a fact that Gwydion's brother Gilvaethwy can be found nowhere else in the entire corpus of Welsh vernacular literature other than in the Fourth Branch, but I propose that he is one and the same, (in the mind of the author of Math vab Mathonwy) with the Amaethon (also Gwydion's brother), of the Cad Goddeu or Kat Godeu (The Battle of the Trees) and of Culhwch ac Olwen. I don’t believe this is a new suggestion either, though I don't recall where I might have read it. Both names contain the Welsh word amaeth, in the case of Gilvaethwy it is the mutated form faeth, and means: farmer or agriculture. The endings in both names 'wy' and 'on' both signify divinity. Others have derived Amaethon from a proto-celtic word ambaxtonos, meaning: 'divine ploughman'.

Like Gilfaethwy in Math, Amaethon, in the poem Kat Godeu is responsible for a war between the Children of Don and the Lord of Annwfn after he steals a dog (Canis Major), a lapwing (Corvus) and a roebuck (Capricornus) from him. Gilfaethwy is the cause of the war in the mabinogi of Math because of his lust for Geowin (who, as explained in 'Lleu Llaw Gyffes and Perseus', is Ursa Minor, and when pregnant Ursa Major which contains The Plough). Gilvaethwy and Amaethon are, then, essentially the same character, playing esentially the same role, with essentially the same name.

The constellation Bootes is also called The Ploughman because he drives the oxen of The Plough, the great asterism of Ursa Major, and is credited by the Greeks with the invention of the plough. Whereas Amaethon appears in Culhwch and Olwen in the remarkable series of exchanges where it is stated that only he could till the field of Ysbaddaden Pencawr in one day, which is precisely what Bootes does - once a day, every day.

In another Greek tradition Bootes is known Arctophylax The Bear Watcher or Lover of the Bear(s) because he gazes upon those constellations, as Gilvaethwy gazes upon Goewin. Accepting all of this, it is easy to see why we can equate Bootes with Gilvaethwy/Amaethon. What is further beginning to emerge at this stage is that, it is not only the direct pictorial clues and the mythical allusions which urge these identifications but also the spatial and geometric relationships which the constellations share.

Gilvaethwy/Amaethon - The Divine Ploughman 

Pryderi, Pwyll and Arawn

Pryderi, Pwyll and Arawn

'...and Pryderi the son of Pwyll was lord over twenty-one cantrefs in the south.'

Having found such a strong case for Math and Goewin as Cepheus and Ursa Minor it would seem inconsistent if the author did not intend that the figure of Pryderi ought similarly to be understood, that is, that the author also assigned a constellation to him. The fact that Math son of Mathonwy and Pryderi son of Pwyll are the two characters who are being juxtaposed in the very first sentence of the Fourth Branch, should, now, at least urge this suspicion. It took some time to fully understand the intentions of the author of the Four Branches in relation to the figure of Pryderi as we find him in Math, but when it did finally dawn on me what was going on, the full mechanism of the swine swindling saga, very quickly, began to unfold, almost literally, before my eyes. What I came to discover was completely extraordinary, and totally unexpected. I think that the identity of Pryderi is tied up with not one but two constellations. Two identical constellations – Orion and Hercules. To explain.

In Trioedd Ynys Prydein, (3rd Ed.) Rachel Bromwich translates triad 84 thus:

'Three Futile Battles of the Island of Britain:

One of them was the battle of Goddau: it was brought about because of the bitch, the roebuck and the plover'.

The other two battles do not concern us here. The reference in the triad is to the poem Kat Godeu attributed to Taliesin. In her notes to this triad Dr. Bromwich writes:

A fragment of a story about the battle, containing two early englynion, is preserved in a seventeenth-century manuscript, Pen. 98B, 81-2... In this passage it is stated, in words which recall the triad, that the battle was brought about, 'because of a white roebuck and a greyhound pup which came from Annwfn, and Amathaon (= Amaethon) vab Don caught them'. According to this account the battle was fought between Amaethon, assisted by his brother Gwydion, and Arawn king of Annwfn... It would appear, then, that there was a tradition about a mythological battle in which Lleu and the sons of Don took part, and it is tempting to connect the allusion to its cause, (i.e. to the animals which Amaethon brought from Annwfn) with the swine originating from Annwfn, which Gwydion steals in the tale of Math... Perhaps originally Gwydion won the swine, as well as the dog and the white roebuck, in a raid upon Annwfn itself rather than upon Dyfed.

In this Dr. Bromwich is at one with W. J. Gruffydd, who commented:

Whether this history of the mysterious Cad Goddeu correctly represents the tradition in every detail or not, we shall be justified in regarding Gwydion as concerned in an animal lifting raid upon Annwvn. It may be supposed therefore that the older tradition described Gwydion himself as the stealer of the swine, not from Dyfed, but from Annwvn. If that is so, then the choice of this particular method of causing war between Pryderi and the family of Don was obvious; it was already supplied by independent tradition.

But what this also suggests is that the roles in the Cad Godeu and in Math are identical, even if names have been changed. Gwydion is present in both and his role is the same in both, to defeat the king of the Otherworld, which he achieves through some form of trickery. The second role is that of Gwydion’s brother, who is the primary cause of the war in both stories - Amaethon in Cad Godeu and Gilvaethwy in Math. They are essentially the same character, and it could be argued that even their names bear a suspicious resemblance to one another, but more on this later. The third role is that of 'Lord of Annwfn' the king of the Otherworld who must be defeated, this part is played by Arawn Pen Annwfn in Cad Godeu and by the ’Powerful Swineherd’ Pryderi in Math. In the first episode of the First Branch the title 'Lord of Annwfn' is transferred from Arawn to Pwyll. Might it then be inferred that Pryderi may have inherited this role, if not the title, from his father? Or put another way; just as Pwyll plays the role of Lord of the Underworld in the First Branch so Pryderi plays the same role in the Fourth Branch. We therefore have a succession of ‘Lords of the Otherworld’ - Arawn - Pwyll - Pryderi. These three have something else in common - they are so similar in appearance that no-one can tell them apart. As Arawn King of Annwfn says to Pwyll:

“You will have my shape and manner, so that neither chamberlain, nor officer, nor any other who has ever followed me shall know that you are not I”. (Ford)

Later in the tale it is the uncanny physical likeness of Pryderi to Pwyll Pen Annwfn which allows Teyrnon to understand Pryderi’s true parentage:

In the matter of appearance, he (Teyrnon) began to realize that he had never seen a son so like his father as the boy was to Pwyll Pen Annwfn.(Ford)

And this ‘exceeding’ similarity is again made plain when Teyrnon presents the boy at the court in Arberth, when he announces:

‘And I believe…that there is none of all this company who will not recognise that the boy is Pwyll’s son.’ ‘There is none,’ said everyone, ‘who is not sure of it.’ (Ford)

Something of significance appeared to being hinted at here and it seemed worth taking a closer look at the opening episode of the First Branch to see what more, if anything, might be learned. The first thing that draws ones attention is the occurrence of 'Glyn Cuch' in both episodes. Also striking is the use of exactly parallel phraseology in the descriptions of Pwyll's journey to Glyn Cuch and Gwydion's flight from Glyn Cuch, as if deliberately inviting a comparison:

Math: 'And from there they went on, and that night they went as far as a commot in Powys which is called, also for the same reason, Mochnant, and they were there that night.

Pwyll: 'This is the part of his realm he wished to hunt - Glyn Cuch .and he set out that night from Arberth, and he came as far as Penn Llwyn Diarwya, and he stayed there that night'.

This was an encouraging start. But it is the following passage, which describes the appearance of the hounds of Arawn which started a train of thought which was to lead to the stellar identities of all three Lords of Annwfn:

        And of all the hounds he had seen in the world, he had never seen dogs of this colour - they were a gleaming shining white, and their ears were red. And as the whiteness of the dogs shone so did their ears.

Canis Major & Canis Minor

Such  is the description of the hunting dogs of Arawn. Now the usual explanation for the white shininess and the red-ears of these dogs of Annwfn and for that matter other shiny white, red eared boars, horses, cattle and hinds etc., (which appear numerously in Welsh and Irish medieval literature), is that this is how the animals of the Otherworld were traditionally described. Or put differently, this red and white shininess acted as a signal enabling a contemporary medieval audience or readership to identify and anticipate imminent magical contact with the Otherworld. This has always seemed to me not so much an explanation as a tautology. It does not tell us anything about why these unearthly creatures are ‘gleaming shining white, or why their ears are shiny and red. It was noticed in the section on Culhwch and Olwen that Drudwyn the whelp of Greid son of Eri or Fierce-White the whelp of Scorcher son of Eri was a barely underhand reference to Canis Major the Great Dog and the brightest star Sirius the 'Scorcher' son of(?) Orion, which Aratus described in the Phenomena '… the tip of its jaw is inset with a formidable star, that blazes most intensely: and so men call it the Scorcher. So, it occurred to me that in the description of Arawn's hounds in Math we have a similar reference, but now to both hunting dogs of Orion, the constellations Canis Major and Canis Minor - the Greater Dog and the Lesser Dog. Canis Major contains Sirius the brightest, shiniest star in the sky and his ears are marked by two red stars. Canis Minor contains Procyon, the fifth brightest star and is commonly depicted as a spaniel, or such-like, with a white coat and red ears. It seemed to me that the author of the First Branch had clearly provided as obvious a clue as he possibly could that Arawn the hunter and the ‘Cwn Annwfn’ are to be associated with the constellations depicting the celestial hunter Orion and his hounds, Canis Major and Canis Minor. Welsh tradition places the presence in the night sky of the Cwn Annwfn in the late Autumn, Winter and early Spring, precisely the months when Orion and his hounds dominate the southern night sky. The fact that it is Gwynn ap Nudd who is usually said to be the hunter who leads the Cwn Annwfn, may only reflect a separate, perhaps earlier insular tradition about these constellations.

The similarity in the names Orion and Arawn is undeniable and this becomes even more striking in the pronunciation; Orion -uh-rahy-uhn, Arawn -A-ra-oon. Clearly then, it seems not unlikely that Arawn is a Welsh rendering of the Greek Orion. Who then is Pwyll? If Arawn can be identified with Orion, who does he exchange places with? Consider the position of Orion as he appears on Ptolemaic constellation charts. Firstly, he is entirely below the Ecliptic, (the apparent path of the sun, moon and the planets) he is also neatly dissected through the three stars of his belt by the Celestial Equator, (this is the Earth's Equator extended out into space). Thus he occupies the liminal space between the Heavens above (the Northern celestial hemisphere) and the Underworld, (the Southern celestial hemisphere).This is most obviously illustrated in the charts which were drawn up by Schaubach towards the end of the 18th century, but based upon the Eratosthenean and Ptolemaic catalogues compiled in the 3rd Century BC and the 2nd Century AD, respectively.

The upper body of Orion is positioned at the edge of the Northern chart, whilst the lower torso and legs appear at the edge of the Southern chart. The figure of Orion can only be resolved if the two circular charts are placed one above the other and turned around their centres so that the two halves of the figure are joined where the charts touch at the celestial equator. With the maps so arranged it will be observed that directly above Orion, at the top of the Northern chart is another figure almost indistinguishable from Orion. This is the constellational figure of Hercules. Both figures are the same size. The pose is the same; right leg bent under, the left leg bent up but with the foot apparently to the ground. Both figures hold a club in the right hand, held high above the head. Both figures wear a lionskin. Traditionally, both are hunters, but strangely both have also been envisaged as the prey which they hunt, i.e. the stag, (Allen). The spatial relationship is also striking. To all intents and purposes these two constellational figures are identical. This resemblance is certainly not illusory and is well known to historians of Astronomy. In her book 'The Stargazers Guide', Emily Winterburn (former Curator of Astronomy at the Royal Observatory, Greenwich) notes of Orion:

              'It's hard to ignore the similarity to the Hercules story ... Our hero is set impossible tasks, he destroys the relationship with the woman he loves while in a state of diminished responsibility and turns to the oracle for redemption. He even wears a lionskin, although it isn't commented upon in the Orion story. These similarities have provoked some commentators to suggest that both characters derive from the same source.

            The name Orion comes from Sumerian Uru-anna meaning 'light of heaven'. This is different from the Sumerian name for Hercules, Gilgamesh; so the Sumerians, who pre-date the Greeks and are the source for much of Greek mythology, must have had separate characters too. What is puzzling is that Orion is depicted wearing a lionskin and fighting Taurus, the bull. No myth appears to exist in which Orion kills a lion or fights a bull; but both the Greek Hercules and the Sumerian Gilgamesh do'.

Hercules and Orion as Pwyll and Arawn in Branch One, and as the double identity of Pryderi in Branch Four

It is important to be aware that this correspondence between the two constellation figures has nothing whatsoever to do with the appearance of their respective stars which they overlie and represent. Orion is probably the brightest and most recognisable of all the stellar groupings, whilst Hercules contains no bright stars and is not easily made out without reference to nearby constellations. It is crucially important to make the distinction between a constellation or 'star group' and the figure which traditionally represents that group of stars. The visual similarity between Orion and Hercules is only apparent in the context of constellational charts. The point is that if one were to 'cut and paste' Orion into Hercules' position and vice versa, nobody would know the difference. Says Arawn to Pwyll: "I shall arrange that no man or woman in your realm realizes that I am not you, and I will take your place". (Davies)

This notion of the two figures changing places may be based on the astronomical observation that when, during the winter months Orion dominates the night sky, rising to his highest point in the South, Hercules is in the North and setting below the horizon. Conversely during the Summer Hercules dominates the Northern celestial dome, whilst Orion has now returned to his realm beneath the Southern horizon. Indeed, the ’man who was Arawn’s’ defeat of Hafgan (Summer-white) at the ford has led some commentators to suggest a seasonal allegory behind this episode. There is an evident similarity, which has not gone unnoticed elsewhere, with this single combat and that between Pryderi and Gwydion in the Fourth Branch, both take place at a ford, (The Milky Way) victory is achieved in each case by the use of force and of magic, but here in a complete reversal, it is the son of the ’man who was Arawn’ who is defeated and Gwydion/Cygnus, The (white) Swan of Summer, who is the victor.

It is therefore, this ability of Hercules/Pwyll and Orion/Arawn to interchange magically, pictorially, seasonally and astronomically, explicit in the First Branch, which informs us of the double identity of Pryderi in the Fourth Branch. In the first case an audience would see Pryderi son of Pwyll Pen Annwfn as Orion, the dominant figure of the 21 constellations of the southern hemisphere, as Pryderi is the dominant figure of the 21 cantrefs of the South. He is the inheritor of the role Lord of Annwfn, which his (identical) father, Pwyll, in turn inherited from his (identical) friend Arawn, (Orion).

Later in the tale when the twelve northern bards go to south Wales (or otherwise Annwfn, the southern celestial hemisphere), Pryderi will now be seen to be Hercules being entertained by Gwydion with his harp, (Cygnus and Lyra). Later still during the fight at the ford (The Milky Way), both Hercules (now upside down) and Orion (now split in two) combine to show how Gwydion defeated Pryderi by strength and by magic.

The tale does not mention the number of cantrefs in the north, but historically Gwynedd combined with Powys make up 26 cantrefs, just 1 short of the constellations of Ptolemy's northern hemisphere. Within the first few paragraphs of Math a remarkable relationship between the geopolitical cartography of early medieval Wales and the Ptolemaic charts emerges, this theme of 'as above so below' pervades Math and finds it's most astonishing articulation in the form of Gwydion's circuitous route with the pigs and afterwards in the naming of Llew Llaw Gyffes.

Gwydion/Cygnus disguised as a Pencerdd or Chief Poet, wearing his swan-feather tugen and playing his crwth or lyre as he entertains Pryderi in his guise as Hercules.

Geometry in Irish Maps

Geometry in Irish Maps

Ptolemy's Ibernia Britannica. (c. 87 - 150 AD). It is tempting to see in the three islands centered on the line of longitude in the Irish Sea (Mona, Limnos and ?) the source for the three mysterious islands which sometimes appear in the first printed maps of  Ireland

Hiberniae Britannicae Insvlae Nova Descriptio published by Abraham Ortelius in 1592. Note the phantom islands below Dublin on the east coast.

The underlying structure of the map is a fusion of circle and square, and the 'islands' can be seen to function as the eastern side of that square. The rendering of the North half of Ireland as a circle is very reminiscent of the depiction of South Wales in Cambriae Typus which is also based on a circle - the circle which is delineated by Gwydion's pig sties in Math vab Mathonwy. These two maps (Cambriae Typus and Hiberniae Britannicae), are clearly part of the same tradition of Cartography which generated the 'Angel of Lincoln', The Lion of Scotland and The Unicorn of England.

Mercator's Irlandia of 1602 has relegated the phantom isles to mere sand banks as 'South ground', 'Middel ground' and 'North ground' but still retains the tradition of the Giant's Head with it's Lake of the Red Eye.

The following is Lady Guest's translation of the famous 'night watchman scene' from the Second Branch or Branwen Daughter of Llyr.

The King's Head.

Then he proceeded with what provisions he had on his own back, and approached the shore of Ireland.

Now the swineherds of Matholwch were upon the sea-shore, and they came to Matholwch. 

"Lord," said they, "greeting be unto thee." 

"Heaven protect you," said he, "have you any news?" 

"Lord," said they, "we have marvellous news, a wood have we seen upon the sea, in a place where we never yet saw a single tree." 

"This is indeed a marvel," said he; "saw you aught else?" 

"We saw, lord," said they, "a vast mountain beside the wood, which moved, and there was a lofty ridge on the top of the mountain, and a lake on each side of the ridge. And the wood, and the mountain, and all these things moved." 

"Verily," said he, "there is none who can know aught concerning this, unless it be Branwen."

Messengers then went unto Branwen. "Lady," said they, what thinkest thou that this is?" 

"The men of the Island of the Mighty, who have come hither on hearing of my ill treatment and my woes." 

"What is the forest that is seen upon the sea?" asked they. 

"The yards and the masts of ships," she answered. 

"Alas," said they, "what is the mountain that is seen by the side of the ships?" 
"Bendigeid Vran, my brother," she replied, "coming to shoal water; there is no ship that can contain him in it." 

"What is the lofty ridge with the lake on each side thereof?" 

"On looking towards this island he is wroth, and his two eyes, one on each side of his nose, are the two lakes beside the ridge."

Mercator's map, as well as maps derived from it, also kept to a strict underlying geometry, which in this case is comprised of two adjacent squares.

Giraldus Cambrensis' (Gerald of Wales, c. 1146-1223) map of Ireland from the Topographia Hiberniae, suggests that he was not really capable of producing the now lost Totius Kambria Mappa, which is sometimes attributed to him and which Henry Owen described as 'a map of the whole of Wales, with the mountains. rivers, towns, castles and monasteries carefully set out'. 

(See 'The Journey of the Swine' for the significance of this).


On the other hand it is clear that Rhygyfarch ap Sulien,, judging 

from the following excerpt from his Vita Davidus, possessed a 

more sophisticated concept of a map of Ireland:  

"Rejoice, Patrick, for the Lord hath sent me to you that I may show you the whole of the island of Ireland from the seat which is in Vallis Rosina," which now is named "the Seat of Patrick." And the angel says to him, "Exult, Patrick, for you shall be the apostle of the whole of that island which you see, and you shall suffer many things in it for the name of the Lord your God, but the Lord will be with you in all things which you shall do, for as yet it has not received the word of life; and there you ought to do good; there the Lord has prepared a seat for you; there you shall shine in signs and miracles, and you shall subdue the whole people to God. Let this be to you for a sign. I will show you the whole island. Let the mountains be bent; the sea shall be made smooth; the eye bearing forth across all things, looking out from [this] place, shall behold the promise." At these words he raised his eyes from the place in which he was standing, which now is called "the Seat of Patrick," and beheld the whole island.

Culhwch ac Olwen, Authorship. (part one)

Culhwch ac Olwen, Authorship. (part one)

The Ricemarch Psalter, circa 1080, the start of Psalm 1:"Beatus vir..."

Who in eleventh/twelfth century Wales would write such a thing and why?

In his study of the Irish affinities in the Second Branch of the Mabinogi ' Branwen Daughter of Llyr' Proinsias Mac Cana showed that "a reasonable case could be made for attributing Branwen – and the Mabinogi as a whole – to Rhygyfarch or his father Sulien, or to the two in collaboration"ⁱ. In the same tentative spirit in which Mac Cana offered this suggestion, I think that an equally reasonable case could be made which suggests that Ieuan ap Sulien (again, perhaps in collaboration with Rhygyfarch and Sulien himself), may also be implicated in the writing of Culhwch ac Olwen. First of all, some of Mac Cana's more general arguments regarding the authorship of Branwen may be usefully employed here too. For instance, as Mac Cana says: 'It was in the (Irish) monasteries that the judgement and taste of the classical scholars were united with an enthusiasm for native tradition and literature. If this means anything in terms of Welsh literature, then the most likely place to look for the author of Branwen (for which read 'the author of Culhwch') is in a Welsh monastic community, in that same cultural atmosphere which produced Nennius and Gerald and Geoffrey'. Material evidence for this notion of a monastic backdrop within which Culhwch was composed has been noticed by Bromwich and Evans: 'Culhwch ac Olwen bears the signs of having been shaped by an author familiar with Christian customs and practices'. They point to mentions in the text of prayer, baptism, the use of 'God' in greetings, a bishop (Bitwini Escob), a priest (Kethtrum Offeiriad), a guardian angel, saints, devils, Hell, Creation and divine intervention. They further point to the 'author's evident familiarity with the native learning of the Welsh church', mentioning specifically: the Mirabilia attached to the Historia Brittonum, and Bonedd y Sant, The Life of St Cadog by Lifris of Llancarfan and the Life of St David by Rhygyfarch of Llanbadarn. Thus far both Rhygyfarch and Ieaun would have to be amongst the list of candidates, along with, say, Lifris of Llancarfan, who could have been the author of Culhwch. 

There is, however some additional internal evidence which, I believe, furthers the case for Ieuan son of Sulien considerably. The 'catalogue of the court' contains the following genealogical list:

'Teregud son of Iaen, Sulien son of Iaen, Bradwen son of Iaen, Moren son of Iaen, Siawn son of Iaen, and Cradawg son of Iaen – they were men of Caer Dathl, related to Arthur on their father's side (i.e. Iaen's)'.

The name Sulien (Sulyen in the MS) which means 'Sun-born' was 'extremely rare' in medieval Wales, and for that reason alone it jumps off the page here, so to find it linked to the patronym Iaen in this list is highly suggestive. Bromwich and Evans note: Iaen 'ice', but it does not stretch credulity to see here also a form of Ieuan 'John', Latin Iohannes, which is how Ieuan ap Sulien autographed his Latin poetry, (with the monogram IO). They point out the occurence of the names Siaun and Kyradawg, (Siawn and Cradawg) 'among the six sons and daughters of 'Iaen', as found in the late 14^th century Bonedd yr Arwyr 'Descent of Heroes', (which also refers to the familial relationship with Arthur). The full list goes:

Plant Iaen (Children of Iaen)
Dirmig, Gwyn goluthonⁱⁱ, Siaun, Kyradawg, Ievannwy, Llychlyn, Eleirchⁱⁱⁱ verch Iaen mam Kyduan ap Arthur.

The list of the sons of Iaen in the court list in Culhwch is followed immediately by a list of the many sons of Kaw and it cannot be coincidental that this is also the case in Bonedd yr Arwyr . Now, it has been argued that the Bonedd yr Arwyr genealogies, despite their late appearance, must represent the earlier tradition because if it were otherwise they would have followed more closely the lists in Culhwch. Note then, that the rare name Sulien does not appear in the Bonedd yr Arwyr genealogical lists, it has in fact been bodily inserted into the list as it appears in Culhwch, and it seems likely therefore, that the author of Culhwch has manipulated the pre-existing genealogy to suit his own ends, whatever they were. Bromwich and Evans, who would prefer a Carmarthen or Llancarfan origin for the tale, acknowledge that this 'was the name of the famous 11^th.-cent. Abbot of Llanbadarn Fawr and later Bishop of St. David's' and in view of several other internal references to St. Davids/Mynyw it can be taken as almost certain that the Sulien in this list is one and the same with the 'famous' Sulien of Llanbadarn-Fawr. An intriguing possibility arises from this assessment: either Sulien himself or his son Ieuan may have been responsible for this 'interpolation'.

Though none are recorded, it is possible that Ieuan son of Sulien may have had a son or sons of his own, but his obituary in the Brut y Tywysogyon hints of a life of celibacy, - s.a. 1136 (1137): 'In that year died Ieuan, archpresbyter of Llanbadarn, the most learned of the learned, having led a pious life without mortal sin till his death'. However, he almost certainly had a foster son, who was named after Sulien. The custom of naming the grandson after the grandfather was one which Ieuan's brother Rhygyfarch followed when he named one of his sons after Sulien^iv, Rhygyfarch died at the age of 42 and as a consequence his son Sulien ap Rhygyfarch became a "foster son of Llanbadern Fawr", which probably means that his uncle, Rhygyfarch's possibly childless brother Ieuan, the 'archpresbyter of Llanbadarn Fawr' became the foster father. It may not be a coincidence that Rhygyfarch died in 1099 and the most common date given for the composition of Culhwch is about 1100.

It may have been that Ieuan, supposing he was our author, in his trawl through the native genealogical material, (probably in the libraries at both Mynyw and Llanbadarn) in his search for names to enter into the hilariously overblown court list, came across a name very similar to his own in a version of Bonedd yr Arwyr, and, in the process of compiling the extended role call in Culhwch, he took the opportunity to insert his (foster) 'son's' name in to that list. Ieuan's praise of his father and brothers in his introductory poem to De Trinitate (see below) amply demonstrates his deep love for his immediate family members and his readiness to incorporate them into his literary output. Has Ieuan, at a stroke, written himself into his story by incorporating his recently berieved foster 'son' into the list of the men of Arthur's court, as an inclusive, affectionate and sympathetic gesture towards him? Ieuan mab Sulien's authorship of Culhwch might well explain the 'interpolated' Sulien mab Iaen in the Arthurian court list.

If there is any truth in this, 'Sulien son of Iaen' would be amongst only a handful of historical figures, to appear in Culhwch, who were alive at the time of its composition. One other such figure is Gwilhenen brenhin Freinc (William king of France) who 'probably stands for William the Conqueror'. It is highly likely, and of great significance then, that Ieuan had direct contact with William during his famous 'pilgrimage' to St. Davids in 1081, when his father Sulien was serving his second term as bishop of that cathedral. To quote Bromwich and Evans again:

'Sir Idris Foster stressed the historical events of the year 1081 as significant for the dating of Culhwch, and these events point to a period of composition similar to that indicated by the ecclesiastical sources. In 1081 Gruffudd ap Cynan came across from his exile in Ireland and landed (like the Twrch Trwyth) at Porth Clais near St. David's, where he joined with Rhys ap Tewdwr, the ruler of Deheubarth, and won the battle of Mynydd Carn. In the same year William the Conquerer is said to have visited St. David's, where it is most likely that he made peace with Rhys ap Tewdwr. It is not unlikely that these happenings were in the mind of the author of Culhwch, and that they had an influence on his portrayal of certain events in the story'. 

As Nora Chadwick surmised, 'I think that we can hazard a guess that it was Sulien or one of his family who was responsible for the negotiations between the two Welsh princes and the Conqueror at St. David's'. It is easy to imagine that Ieuan, along with Sulien's other sons, was present at this historic encounter and there can be little doubt of Ieuan's implication in these events, however peripheral^v. Ieuan's authorship of Culhwch might well explain the inclusion of Gwilhenen brenhin Freinc and the landings of the Twrch Trwyth (Gruffudd ap Cynan) at Porth Clais and of Arthur at Mynyw.

If this is true, as seems likely, that these events were 'in the mind of the author of Culhwch', then it is certainly true of the Latin 'Life of David' by Rhygyfarch. Again, Nora Chadwick has argued that the production of Rhygyfarch's Vita Davidus resulted from a desire to commemorate these, apparently peaceful, diplomatic outcomes overseen by Sulien, between William of Normandy and Rhys ap Twdwr and Gruffydd ap Cynan.^vi:

It would seem natural to suppose that the Life of St. David would be composed on this occasion, both in support of Sulien's policy, and in celebration of the visit of the Conqueror to St. David's. We may perhaps regard the Life as one factor in the rapprochement between the native princes of West Wales and their powerful Norman enemy, an appeal by the native Welsh Church to the Conqueror for his protection against encroachment from Canterbury... The shrine of St. David which he had 'honoured' must be duly 'celebrated'. It is probably as a factor in the implementation of this great compact at St. David's in 1081 that we must regard the composition of the Life of the saint.

Rhygyfarch's original version has not survived, but doubtless it would have exhibited all the production values which were lavished upon Rhygyfarch's Psaltery and Martyrology, and on Ieuan's De Trinitate, which have survived and which are decorated with Ieuan's beautiful 'Irish' initials. We may guess a similar arrangement in the making of the Vita and that, in all likelihood, it was Ieuan's expert hand which supplied the decorative initials there also. It seems clear then, that both Culhwch ac Olwen and the Vita Davidus commemorate, each in their own way, the historic events of 1081 at St. David's, and if Sulien and Ieuan ap Sulien are implicated in the one, they are also implicated in the other. These reasons alone, however speculative, provide a narrative which seems reasonable and natural enough to throw strong suspicion upon the family of Sulien, including Rhygyfarch and particularly Ieuan, as being the author/authors of Culhwch ac Olwen.

But now something else, the author of Culhwch seems to have been well versed, to say the least, in late classical astronomical literature and this is a description with particular applicability to the brothers Ieaun and Rhygyfarch.

iWhilst it is true that Mac Cana later took a step back from his emphasis on direct Irish borrowings in Branwen, his arguments placing the composition of these tales in a learned ecclesiastical setting still stand.

ii'Gwyn' - White, Fair, 'goluthon' - the Wealthy?

iiiElierch – 'Swans'. Elierch is 'a township in that part of Llanbadarn-Fawr which is in the upper division of the hundred of Geneu'r Glyn, … 8 1/4 miles [E.N.E.] from Aberystwyth'. This fact may also have caught Ieuan's eye.

iv And whose death was recorded in the year A.D. 1144: 'Julien ap Rythmarch, (sic) one of the college of Llanbadarn, a person of great reading and extensive learning, departed this life'.

v In the Domesday survey of 1086 we learn that Rhys paid the king an annual rent of £40...The argument must have been an official and technical one.

vi See also Wade-Evans' ominous assessment – that it was the related threat of domination by Cantebury which prompted the learned men of Mynyw and Llanbadarn to set down David's Life, as it asserted David's dominion over the whole of Britain in contravention of Canterbury's claims to hegemony.

The Super Nova of 1006 in Culhwch and Olwen. Appendix 1: The Very Black Witch Daughter of the Very White Witch.

The Super Nova of 1006 in Culhwch and Olwen. Appendix 1:

The Very Black Witch Daughter of the Very White Witch.

Note that the Scales are held by Astraea 'Justice'

Arthur said, 'Is there anything now that has not been got of the things hard to find?'

One of the men said, 'Yes, the blood of the Dark Black Witch, Daughter of the Bright White Witch from the Valley of Grief in the uplands of Hell.'

Arthur set out towards the North and came to where the cave of the witch was. And Gwyn son of Nudd and Gwythyr son of Greidawl counselled to send Cacamwri and Hygwydd, his brother, to fight with the witch. And as they came into the cave, the witch rushed towards them and took hold of Hygwydd by the hair of his head and struck him to the floor beneath her. And Cacamwri took hold of her by the hair of her head and pulled her off Hygwydd to the floor, and she turned on Cacamwri and thrashed the two of them soundly and disarmed them, and drove them out whooping and hollering. And Arthur grew angry at seeing his two servants nearly killed, and he sought to rush towards the cave. But then Gwyn and Gwythyr said to him, 'It is not fair and not pleasant for us to see you wrestling with a witch. Send Long Amren and Long Eiddyl to the cave. And they went. And if the trouble was bad for the two earlier, worse was the trouble of those two, so that God knew not one of those four was able to go from that place, except that the four of them were set on Llamrei, Arthur's mare.

And then Arthur rushed towards the entrance of the cave and from the entrance he threw Carnwennan, his knife, at the witch and struck her through the middle until she was as two tubs.

The opening sentence of the penultimate episode in Culhwch, 'Kychwyn a oruc Arthur parth a'r Gogled, a dyuot hyt lle yd oed gogof y wrach', 'Arthur set out towards the North and came to where the cave of the witch was,' coupled with the conspicuous roles played by the 'northerners' Gwyn ap Nudd and Gwythyr vab Greidawl, has suggested to all commentators that the Hag's cave is in The North, i.e. Yr Hen Gogledd, the Old North, the once Brythonic speaking area of what is now part of Strathclyde in South-West Scotland and Cumbria in the North-West of England. And there is no doubt that there are certainly some very old traditions which locate an entrance to the Otherworld somewhere North of Hadrian's Wall. However, there is another way of thinking about the location of this cave and one which does not necessarily contradict this common-sense view.

The more precise address of the Black Witch given by the author, Pennant Gouut yg gwrthtir Uffern, 'the Valley of Grief in the uplands of Hell' indicate that he was not just thinking of some place in North Britain, but also of a very particular place in the sky. The term 'Uffern' in Culhwch has always been translated as 'hell' or 'Hell' as if it were the Christian Hell but this is misleading. In later times this term did come to signify the Christian concept of Hell, as it does in modern Welsh, but patently this cannot be the case here. Neither could it be claimed that this is a description of the entrance to that Happy Otherworld or Annwfn, which we encounter elsewhere in the stories of the Mabinogion. It is well known that 'uffern' is derived from the Latin word inferno, and 'the infernal region' would therefore be the less loaded, more literal, English translation of this word in this context. Because what is being described here is strikingly similar to the entrance to the classical Hades, where the cave of the Very Black Witch in the Valley of Grief seems to be identical to the cave entrance to the 'infernal regions of Dis' in the valley of Grief and Anxiety which is guarded by the 'coal black' or 'pitch black' crone, the Erinye or Fury, Tisiphone. Roaming close by are said to be other mythical beasts including Centaurs and the Lernian Hydra, hinting at the celestial location of the cave.

What the author appears to be offering here is another word-picture; we may see in The Very Black Witch daughter of the Very White Witch an image of Kore (again) otherwise called Persephone, Queen of Hades, daughter of Demeter the goddess of the harvest. In the previous chapter on Dillus the Horseman I pointed out that the abduction of Kreiddylad by Gwyn ap Nudd from Gwythyr ap Greidawl has long been regarded as a British version of the abduction of Persephone by Hades. It should not surprise us, then, to find Gwyn and Gwythyr acting as advisors to Arthur in the matter of the Very Black Witch, for they have both had previous dealings with her, for it is they who will fight for her every May 1^st forever until Judgement Day. Kreiddylat/Kore/Persephone is represented in the night sky as the zodiacal constellation Virgo and the cave of this 'crone' is the constellation Crater, considered by the ancient poets and philosophers to be the souls' entry point into corporeality, situated, as it is, in the uplands of the 'infernal regions of Dis'. Aratus describes it thus:

But if during an evening in the Spring the observer faces South and looks almost overhead, he will see how the souls, passing through the descending portal of Cancer, by veering slightly to the left, would go by Crater.

Note that Aratus points us South and upwards not North, but this did not stop other Greeks and Romans from thinking of entrances to Hades / Dis as being somewhere in the North, or in the West, or for that matter at the Cave of Dionysus, or the Cave at Ithaca. Indeed Macrobius describes it as follows:

Cancer (is) the portal of men, because through it descent is made to the infernal regions; Capricorn (is) the portal of the gods, because through it souls return to their rightful abode of immortality, to be reckoned among the gods.This is what Homer with his divine intelligence signifies in his description of the cave at Ithaca.

Proving that these Cosmic entrance and exit caves could be said, in the same breath, to have both a celestial and a mundane location. A little later Macrobius adds more detail as to the specific celestial address of the cave, although a little confusedly because as Stahl and others have pointed out 'Crater is between Corvus and Hydra' or between Corvus and Leo not Cancer and Leo:

Another clue to this secret is the location of the constellation of the Bowl of Bacchus in the region between Cancer and Leo, indicating that there for the first time intoxication overtakes descending souls with the influx of matter.

So to recap, I think that the Very Black Witch corresponds to Virgo in her guise as Persephone Queen of Hades, (perhaps confused here with Tisiphone the 'pitch black' witch) and the cave of this crone is Crater also known as the Bowl of Bacchus, the portal of descending souls into the infernal regions (Uffern).

Earlier, I gave reasons which strongly suggested that Hygwydd who carries the cauldron on his back should be equated with the serpent Hydra who carries Crater on his back, and that his brother Cacamwri being pulled to the depths by two millstones should be equated with 'long and slender' Serpens being pulled to the depths, (by two mill wheels) due to the precession of the Vernal equinox along the ecliptic. As can be seen from fig ix, if the Black Witch is meant to be Persephone/Virgo then it is now easy to appreciate the author's meaning when he says, 'the witch ... took hold of Hygwydd by the hair of his head and struck him to the floor beneath her. Cacamwri grabbed her by the hair and pulled her off Hygwydd'. This is very much the picture which could be seen from Plinlimon Top on the southern horizon at midnight, May 1^st 1006, the occasion of the first appearence of SN1006: Virgo above and dominating Hydra who is laid out on the ground along the southern horizon, Serpens, ready to strike, above Virgo.

Just in case we missed it the author, as is his wont, tells it again but now Arthur's two servants are called Hir Eiddyl and Hir Amren.

And Arthur grew angry at seeing his two servants nearly killed, and he sought to rush towards the cave. But then Gwyn and Gwythyr said to him, 'It is not fair and not pleasant for us to see you wrestling with a witch. Send Long Amren and Long Eiddyl to the cave. And they went. And if the trouble was bad for the two earlier, worse was the trouble of those two...

The meaning here, unambiguosly, of Hir is 'Long'. Bromwich & Evans suggest for Eiddyl 'weak', and Y Geiriadur Mawr gives 'eiddil FEEBLE, FRAIL, but also SLENDER. Surely Hir Eiddyl should be translated 'Long and Slender', terms often used to describe Serpens and which seems to make much more sense, in any case, than 'Long and Weak'. Hir Amren is also 'Long Something or other', (the meaning of Amren is unclear to me). Who are 'Long and Slender', and 'Long Something' if not these two Serpent Constellations once again?

The jocular image of all four of these 'men' being carried away together, draped across the back of Arthur's mare Llamrei (Grey Leaper), might appear to challenge this analysis, but measured against the accumulative weight of the surrounding evidence it is hardly a killer blow. Firstly, the sending of two lots of two of Arthur's servants to fight the Black Witch is patently another one of those 'doublets', which keep cropping up, to go along with the two boar hunts, the two birds visiting Twrch Trwyth and so on. The narrator consistently uses these doublets to reinforce an image or to get across some other specific aspect of an image. Sometimes this is not immediately apparent, for instance, the image of Hygwydd with the cauldron on his back and the image of Menw with the boar's bristle in his beak are really two aspects of the same 'super constellation' of Hydra, Crater and Corvus. I don't think it is a coincidence that this habit of relating two versions of the same story is also a noted characteristic of the star tales related by Hyginius and Eratosthenes. In addition, in one or other, or both of these doublets it is usual to find that the names of the characters appear to be fairly transparent 'codewords' for the constellations, not just any constellations mind, or made up ones, but only those classical constellations in the vicinity of SN1006, and it is worth repeating here some other examples along side Hir Amren and Hygwydd, and Hir Eiddyl and Cacamwri:

The 'maiden' uorwyn Kreiddylad – Kore - The Maiden = Virgo 
The Very Black Witch daughter of the Very White Witch - split into two tubs –  Persephone Queen of Hades, daughter of Demeter (Tisiphone - 'the pitch black crone'?) = Astraea/Libra?Virgo 
Dillus the Horseman – Pholus the Horseman = Centaurus 
The marchawc 'horseman' Kyledyr Wyllt ('the Wild') – The Wild Horseman = Centaurus 
Menw ab Teirgwaedd (in Bird form) - Little son of Three Shouts - Corvus the Crow
Gwrhyr Interpreter of Languages (in Bird form) - Corvus the Crow
Hygwydd carrying Cauldron = Hydra carrying Crater 
Hir Amreu – Long something = Hydra 
Caccymuri? being pulled to the depths by 'millwheels' = Serpens 
Hir Eiddyl - Long and Slender = Serpens

I said earlier that I thought the author was likening Arthur, in his nine day and nine night battle with Twrch Trwyth for the 'precious things', to Phoebus Apollo's, (the Sun), nine day and nine night journey through Scorpius. What he seems to be describing now, in the denouement to this episode, where Arthur throws Carnwennan, his 'little white knife' at the witch and cuts her in two, is the Sun's journey through Virgo at the Autumn Equinox, the place along the ecliptic where the sun slices through Virgo, splitting her into two parts, and where, in the present 'Age of Pisces' night and day are also divided into two equal parts:

And then Arthur rushed towards the entrance of the cave and from the entrance he threw Carnwennan, his knife, at the witch and struck her through the middle until she was as two tubs.

For the two thousand or so years of the Age of Aries the Autumnul equinox occurred in Scorpius, until around 6BC when the Age of Pisces began, but at some point in late antiquity, (no one knows precisely when) a new constellation was invented, Libra, the Scales, which took the place of The Claws of Scorpius (this is the reason why the sun spends only nine days and nights in the present, curtailed Claws). Hinckley Allen pointed out that it was often said of Libra or 'The Balance', which consists of two pans either side of the thin white line of the ecliptic, 'that the constellation was invented when on the equinox, and so represented the equality of day and night. Virgo was (and, as Justice still is), often pictured holding these Scales.

Astraea's scales have weighed her minutes out, Poised on the zodiac

The sequence of zodiac constellations in this area of the ecliptic which have been progressively 'pulled in to the Depths' at the Autumnal equinox in historical times, if we incude Ophiuchus/Serpentarius – 'the thirteenth house' and Libra the late replacement for the Claws of Scorpius, is as follows: Sagittarius, Scorpius, Serpentarius, Libra, Virgo. this suggests an interesting possibility: Arthur's (The Sun) fight with Twrch Trwyth for the 'Precious Things' (Scorpius), Cacamwri (Serpens/Serpentarius) being dragged to the Depths, and Arthur (Phoebus) splitting into 'two tubs' (Libra) the Very Black Witch (Virgo) with his little white knife (the ecliptic) may well be a display of knowledge concerning this sequence

In 6BC Virgo 'returned to the frame' at the Autumnal equinox, just as Pisces now ruled the Vernal equinox, a cosmic event famously heralded by Virgil as the start of a new Golden Age and which later Christians took as a prophecy of the birth of Christ the Fish, son of the Virgin, a belief which held particular currency in Wales. Virgil said:

“Now comes the last age by the song of the Cumaen sybil;

the great order of the ages is born anew;

now the Virgin returns,

now the reign of Saturn comes again;

now a new child is sent down from heaven above.”

This, of course, is the 'prophecy' alluded to in the ` 'legendary' Taliesinic poem Cad Godeu:

Sages, wise men,

prophesy Arthur!

There is something which has been before

[and] they sang of that which has been:

and one came about

because of the story of the Flood,

and [the second was] Christ's Crucifixion

and [the third is] The Day of Judgement to come.

[Like] a magnificent jewel in a gold ornament

thus I am resplendent

and I am exhilarated

by the prophecy of Virgil

Perhaps there is a suggestion here that the appearance of SN1006 was seen as heralding the emergence of a saviour, a new Arthur, in line with this prophecy. As David Carpenter has pointed out 'The biography of Gruffudd ap Cynan saw its hero as specifically another Arthur, 'king of the kings of the Isle of Britain'.ⁱ

fig ix. The Southern Horizon, Midnight, May 1^st, 1006 A.D. From Plinlimon Top

iThe Penguin History of Britain: The Struggle for Mastery: Britain 1066-1284. By David Carpenter. No wonder an Anglo-Norman survey of Britain in the 1150s lamented how the Welsh 'threaten us... openly they go about saying, by means of Arthur they will have [the island] back... They will call it Britain again'